It took a long time for me to warm up to Rent too. I was intrigued by Rosario's portrayal of Mimi which was different than I had expected. Wasn't really sold on the Roger/Mimi paring, though. I kind of wished they were more innovative with translating the stage version to the big screen.

Sadly, Chris Columbus and "innovative" go together like pickles and ice cream.

This is why I'm waiting to netflix the Rent movie, despite the fact that I've seen it four times on stage, waiting 6+ hours for front row seats at least one of those times.

The first Richard Pryor concert film, Richard Pryor Live in Concert, is the funniest movie ever made. By a wide margin.

No kidding. It's too bad that Comedy Central has chosen to only show one of the lesser concert films as part of its cuss-words-and-all late-night viewing.

I know I've mentioned this before, but the Romanian word for Turkish Delight is "rahat," which is not coincidentally the Romanian slang term for shit.

I wrote a semi-joking essay once about the symbolism of "Turkish Delight" as the form of Original Sin ("The Candy of DOOOOMMM"). It referenced some of the more rascist parts of "The Horse and His Boy" also, and was basically a look at how the degenerate East was perceived. It had to be a candy named from a heathen, non-Christian place - it couldn't be German chocolate, you know?

After 7 reviews, King Kong is the current high score at metacritic with an average of a 95.

That's... ridiculous. Though I think ROTK had that high a score this early and eventually settled down to like an 87 or 88.

The first Richard Pryor concert film, Richard Pryor Live in Concert, is the funniest movie ever made. By a wide margi

I was just saying to the BF that Pryor should be rememebered as one of the greats of screen comedy, up there with Chaplin and The Marx Brothers, for the first concert movie ALONE, let alone the other films he made.

I saw Rent on Thursday. The candle light song is when I started to get into it, also. I did end up loving it by the end. The cast was so pretty. Favorite songs were Tango:Maureen, Light my Candle, Seasons of Love, and Take me as I Am. Jo Ann was way too good for Maureen, though. When it was over I was just a little bit in love with Tracie Thoms and Jesse L. Martin.

I saw Walk the Line last night. I know nothing about Johnny Cash but I liked it okay. Joaquin and Reese did a great job with the singing.

I desperately want WTL and Rent soundtracks now.

Just got back from a showing of Narnia. It was.... Okay. It was well done, and matched the book well enough, although for no discernable reason, the head of the White Witch's secret police had his name changed from Fenris Ulf (one of the all time great character names) to the rather insipid and generic sounding Morgrim.

The main reason I label it as only okay is that the film mostly hammers home the fact the Lord of the Rings was by far the better story -- more nuanced and complex, presenting a world that felt more real, with more depth, breadth, and human frailty.

I plan to see Narnia sometime this week. I don't expect it to be LotR, but from the look of it, I don't expect it to be a total disappointment, either.

From the first glimpse of the first trailer, with the opposing armies rushing at each other across Pelennor the plain, my thought was "I know those mountains!" Now I'm wondering how many stunties and extras, former orcs and elves, are in those opposing armies in Narnia? A friend saw a behind the scenes-ish special on the making of Narnia, and dear Richard Taylor was there, being his up-WETA geeky self. Bless.

That's about the best way to put it, Bev -- Not LotR, but not a total disappointment, either.